In his refreshingly frank and informative address to the Land Warfare Conference last month MAJGEN John Caligari, Head of Modernisation and Strategic Planning – Army said his most important lesson was that everything was a balance and that required the Chief of Army to exercise considerable judgement.
He continued:
• “It’s a balance between COTS and MOTS versus development solutions.
“This balance equates to us soldiers as getting something sooner and therefore less likely to be old-hat when we get it, but having greater integration issues, versus waiting for what often seems to be an eternity to get something that ends up not necessarily being what we want because it’s taken so long.
• “It’s a balance between acquiring something that is expensive up front in capital and potentially less in sustainment costs versus something that is cheaper but has significantly greater implications for the other fundamental inputs to capability over time.
• “It’s a balance between acquiring a capability all at once that is a best fit across the entire Army with the expectation that we will not look to replace it for 10 years versus keeping the acquisition small and focussed on the differing needs within Army so that we buy less more often keeping the best capability with those who most need it, risking a greater number of disparate fleets.”